Dwight Longenecker

Two New Novels ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Incarnating the truth in art is the supreme test for a writer with convictions, and this problem is the real heart of the tension between entertainment and literature. I had a friend in England I’ll call Rosemary. She had always wanted to be a writer, so she honed her craft and eventually got a contract […]

Blind Benjamin Franklin ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Even today, many Americans take an intentionally anti-intellectual stance, agreeing with the rationalists that faith and reason are incompatible. Blind Benjamin Franklin is father to them all. Apart from his rejection of wigs and the incident with the kite, the key and the lightning bolt, I’m afraid I have never been impressed or attracted to […]

A Conversation ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Peco Gaskovski’s “Exogenesis” has been described as “Blade Runner meets the Benedict Option.” In the novel, a thousand-mile metropolis named Lantua has emerged from the collapse of the USA. Artificial birthing and strict reproductive control is enforced with hi-tech social conditioning, 24-7 monitoring by the state, and the total loss of freedom, disguised by smooth […]

An Endangered Species ~ The Imaginative Conservative

When will men in hats come back? When men come back. When we push back from our desks and laptops, turn off the television and go back outdoors where we belong, we will start to need hats again. Whatever happened to the hat? Whither the fedora? Where have they stashed the Stetsons? Who has banished […]

Did Matthew Make Up the Magi? ~ The Imaginative Conservative

When researching the story of the Magi visiting the Christ child in Bethlehem, it is not long before one discovers the scholar’s opinion that the Magi story is likely to be a story concocted by the early Christians—and probably Matthew himself, in order to show Jesus to be the long-looked-for Messiah and fulfillment of the […]

Did the Three Wise Men Really Exist? ~ The Imaginative Conservative

It is easy to understand why skeptical New Testament scholars have relegated the magi from Matthew’s gospel to the realm of fantasy. Were they fanciful figures from the imagination of  Matthew, or historical figures who existed at the time of Christ’s birth? Every good fantasy story needs a magician. Dorothy encounters the Wizard of Oz. […]